A night like this
by Anae-chan
Summary: On a night like this, Shusei can't sleep.  Shusei/Hotsuma.


_Title__: A night like this  
__Author__: Anae  
__Beta__: Azrax (Thousand thank you's, once again. And I'm still sorry, you know what I mean.)  
__Fandom__: Uragiri wa boku no namae wo shitteiru / Betrayal knows my name  
__Characters/pairing__: Shusei/Hotsuma  
__Rating__: PG-13  
__Spoilers__: Through their arch in manga/anime.  
__Disclaimer__: I don't own Uraboku, it belongs to Odagiri Hotaru.  
__Summary__: On a night like this, Shusei can't sleep.  
__A/N__: I blame this one on my friend. One evening, she sent me a message saying: "I crashed." About half an hour later, we talked on the phone. Thank God nothing happened to her, and in the end, the repairs on her car weren't massive.  
__What do I do after I hung up the phone? I sit on my dark room, staring at my laptop, mind whirling. Then I open Microsoft Works and start writing, and this one came out.  
__Feedback:__ Please be so kind that you drop a review. I'd really love to know how this turned out to be, my very first fic of this fandom._

The bedroom is swallowed by darkness. Darkness so thick that almost nothing can get through it. But, only almost.

The bright stars are shining, glimmering beautifully behind the window. The curtains aren't closed, they never are, so the shining light reaches the dark bedroom. Those fragile rays of starlight, even if they look so weak, can find their way through the night sky, through the raven black night.

In those nights, Shusei lays on the bed, tired eyes gazing the stars. His worn body is begging him to give it the break it needs, his muscles screaming for deserved rest. Even the dreams, those he should be seeing now, are all around him, whispering to him, begging him to join them, to become part of them. But he can't.

On a night like this, Shusei can't sleep. Not that he ever sleeps much, but on these nights… The sleep, he doesn't get any at all. The silvery web of dreams can't catch the boy, can't intertwine around him, no matter how hard it tries, no matter how tempting promises it whispers.

Shusei closes his eyes for a moment, trying to shut the world away. The youngster, in fact, is very good at that. He always keeps his distance, so kindly that no one even notices. He likes everyone, and everyone likes him; but no one truly knows him. No one can tell whether his smile is real or a well-practiced fake.

No one has found the key to open his locked heart.

Or the one that holds the key doesn't realise what he has. Doesn't know how to put it to the keyhole and twist the lock open.

And if he'd know, would he have enough courage to open it, to see the bare, broken soul inside? To see, that behind God's Eyes, there's darkness?

In silence, Shusei can hear the light footsteps closing the distance between the room and the walker, he can hear the tiniest crack as the door between them is slowly, as quietly as possible, pushed open.

"Shusei? Are you asleep?"

It takes a while for the older boy to answer. He must decompose himself after being so lost in his traitorous thoughts, lost to the memory of two boys standing beside a piano, the other pushing the curtains off, the two of them gazing the stars together.

"_It's nighttime. Why are you opening the curtains?"_

When Shusei's pretense-mode is back on, he answers. "No."

He doesn't need to turn to see the smile on his partner's face. He can hear it in younger boy's voice, in that amazing voice that has given him the reason to live all these years. "Thought so." A pause, moment of complete silence, even the wind outside is so quiet it cannot be heard inside the mansion. Just the stars, just the memory.

"_Because! Look how beautiful stars are! How can you close curtains on them?"_

"Can I… Can I come to sleep in your bed?"

"If that's what you want", comes the practiced answer. The only thing that's betraying the older boy's feelings is the tiny smile on his face. For once, it's not the stunning fake he has carried around so long it's become, as scary as it is, perfect. As long as he's needed, or even his bed is needed, he has the right to be here. Right to stay beside this person.

Even if he cannot heal his wounds.

The bed let's out a small crack, little complaint about having two sleepers instead of one. It doesn't break though, this has happened before. So many times it has gotten used to it. But the complaint is still needed, just for the show.

Shusei feels his partner crawl into the soft bed, to slip under the same sheet as he is, and pressing close. No part of their bodies is touching, but he can feel the warmth radiating from his partner.

That warmth, it means more to him that he can ever tell.

Maybe it's because he doesn't have that kind of warmth. He's always cold, always freezing. His partner is the fire, he's the ice. Sometimes he fears he'll extinguish those beautifully dangerous flames. After all, his mere existence pains the other one, the one he's supposed to protect.

"You're cold", the younger boy notes. Then he moves closer, so that his chest is next to his partner's back. "You'll catch cold if this keeps going", he continues, genuinely worried, his warm hand soothing the cold one.

Shusei doesn't answer, he doesn't have to. He won't catch a cold, because then he wouldn't be able to fight beside Hotsuma, he couldn't protect him from Duras. The boy already has hard time living with himself, but being responsible for physically hurting Hotsuma, the wounds he's inflicted mentally are beyond repair already, that he couldn't take.

Besides, he won't get a cold. Not when he has the other boy beside him, radiating warmth, melting his ice walls.

Should those walls melt too much, it'd be treacherous.

So, instead of speaking, he pushes his head further on pillow, closing his eyes.

That's when the familiar feeling of guilt raises its resting head, whispering the truths, which he hopes he could call lies, but he can't, they're truths, since the other boy is closely watching him. He's blown up again, making his best friend worried.

He's such a failure. As a friend, as a partner.

"I'm fine", he offers, trying to repair the damage done. He's far too tired, far too worn to wear that perfectly placed mask anymore. He knows he can't shake the worries off, but he has to try. Not for his sake of dignity or pride, but for Hotsuma.

The younger of the two won't stop eyeing him. "You're not", he answers, voice surprisingly calm. Shusei can't trace any clues of frustration or anger that usually are there by this point, or maybe he is just too tired himself. He knows he frustrates his partner with his wrong words, time and time again, the never-ending treadmill. And yet he always comes back, as lovingly as always.

Because, even if Hotsuma doesn't realise it himself, he is a kind person. Even after everything he's been through, he's so gentle and caring. It's just amazing.

"_They call it God's Voice… He's nothing more than a monster!"_

"_Shusei, they know. They all know I set people on fire. No one even tries to look at me. Shusei… I'm really here, aren't I?"_

Hotsuma's hand on his chest brings Shusei back to this moment. As he realises what his partner is about to do, his own hand flews there and grabs his partner's. He doesn't want Hotsuma to look, to touch, to torment himself more than he already has. "Don't", he silently asks_._

But, in the end, when it comes to Hotsuma, Shusei's too weak, has always been. "Please" is the word that melts the ice walls that are still holding on, and he has no place to argue anymore.

As Hotsuma touches those scars on his chest, he doesn't dare to turn and meet his partner's stardust eyes. Even if Hotsuma said he would never again look away from those scars, it's not that easy, it never is.

Those burnings, neither of them never forgets how Shusei got them, how he stopped Hotsuma from killing himself with his own flames, mixture of yellow, orange, red and white.

"_Disappear, Renjou Hotsuma."_

"_Hotsuma!"_

"_Are you crazy…? Let me go! You'll burn too!"_

"_No! I won't let go! Did you forget? If you do this, then we will never see each other again! Not even in next life! If you still want to die… Then take me with you…! Don't leave me alone here-"_

How Shusei pulled him back to a place he didn't want to stay.

Shusei doesn't know if those awful marks mean anything else to Hotsuma, but deep inside he hopes, so naively begs they do. That they are not only the proof of how he forced him to stay, not only the display of his God's Voice's destructive power.

"I told you I'd never look away from these again, didn't I?" Hotsuma whispers, his forehead on Shusei's neck. "So I never will." That hand, that powerful, gentle hand, presses on the marked skin as Shusei's hand grips it gently. He doesn't answer, he doesn't have to. Hotsuma is the one who has the right words, so he can say them. Meanwhile, Shusei can only hope Hotsuma understands.

And he does. Even if neither of the two Zweilts sees it, little by little, step by step, they're healing.

"_Thank you. Your God's Voice is really amazing."_

_The times I cursed myself are finally over._

And, even if they cannot see, they both know something. That for the time being, before they heal enough to be the truthful about their real feelings towards each other, that something is enough.

After all, no one else knows how hard it is for Shusei to sleep on the nights when the darkness has taken over and the delicate stars are so hardly trying to prove it wrong.

And on no one else's arms he can find undisturbed sleep.


End file.
